Can rheumatoid arthritis affect your lungs?

Answer From April Chang-Miller, M.D.

Although rheumatoid arthritis primarily affects joints, it sometimes also causes lung disease. Occasionally, lung problems surface before the joint inflammation and pain of rheumatoid arthritis.

Men in their 50s and 60s who have more-active rheumatoid arthritis and a history of smoking are more likely to develop rheumatoid arthritis-related lung disease.

The lung problems most often linked to rheumatoid arthritis include:

  • Scarring within the lungs. Scarring related to long-term inflammation (interstitial lung disease) may cause shortness of breath, a chronic dry cough, fatigue, weakness and loss of appetite.
  • Lung nodules. Small lumps can form in the lungs (rheumatoid nodules), as well as in other parts of the body. Lung nodules usually cause no signs or symptoms, and they don't pose a risk of lung cancer. In some cases, however, a nodule can rupture and cause a collapsed lung.
  • Pleural disease. The tissue surrounding the lungs, known as the pleura (PLOOR-uh), can become inflamed. Pleural inflammation is often accompanied by a buildup of fluid between two layers of the pleura (pleural effusion). Sometimes the fluid resolves on its own. A large pleural effusion, however, can cause shortness of breath. Pleural disease may also cause a fever and pain on breathing.
  • Small airway obstruction. The walls of the lungs' small airways can become thickened because of chronic inflammation and infection (bronchiectasis) or inflamed or injured (bronchiolitis). This may cause mucus to build up in the lungs, as well as shortness of breath, a chronic dry cough, fatigue and weakness.

Contact your doctor promptly if you have rheumatoid arthritis and experience any unexplained breathing problems. Sometimes treatment is aimed at the rheumatoid arthritis. In other cases, treatment involves medication to suppress the immune system or a procedure to remove fluid surrounding the lungs.

From Mayo Clinic to your inbox

Sign up for free and stay up to date on research advancements, health tips, current health topics, and expertise on managing health. Click here for an email preview.

To provide you with the most relevant and helpful information, and understand which information is beneficial, we may combine your email and website usage information with other information we have about you. If you are a Mayo Clinic patient, this could include protected health information. If we combine this information with your protected health information, we will treat all of that information as protected health information and will only use or disclose that information as set forth in our notice of privacy practices. You may opt-out of email communications at any time by clicking on the unsubscribe link in the e-mail.

Sept. 21, 2023 See more Expert Answers